DEFINITION AND IMPORTANCE OF TURNOVER

Turnover refers to the amount of movement of employees in and out of an organization, normally present in terms of the turnover rate. Mobley gave the meaning of employee turnover as the discontinuance of membership in an organization by the person who received monetary compensation from the organization. Tanke has defined turnover as the movement of employees out of the organization. Carley states that employees turnover means the rotation of workers around the labour market, between organizations, jobs and careers.
All the above mentioned turnover definition by different scholars helped the researcher in concluding that the movements of employees, who received monetary compensation from the organization, by rotating around the labour market, between organizations, jobs and careers, normally present in terms of the turnover rate.
The result of several business surveys has shown that the first issue facing business is searching and maintaining quality employees. In United States, the average annual employee turnover rate for all companies is 12 percent. Wisconsin state study 1996, helped us in finding that 75 percent of the requirement for new employees is to replace workers who have already left the company. Some ways of employee turnover positively benefits the organizations. This happens when a poor performance employee is replaced by a more productive employee, and can occur when a senior retirement allows the promotion or acquisition to welcome 'fresh blood'. The more valuable the employees the more damaging the resignation, particularly when they move on to work for competitors. Moderate levels of staff turnover can also help to reduce staff costs in organizations where business levels are unpredictable month by month. When business is slack it is straightforward to hold off filling recently created vacancies for some weeks.
However, turnover costs of many organizations are very high and significantly affect the financial performance of an organization. Direct costs include recruitment, selection, and training of new people. Much time and expense go into this process. Indirect costs include specific things as increased workloads and overtime expenses for coworkers, as well as reduced productivity associated with low employee morale. Estimated costs vary from organization to organization. It has been also estimated that, on average, it costs a company one-third of a new hire's annual salary to replace an employee. Hence it is the duty of the management to take employee turnover seriously as it could have both tangible and intangible impact on the financial position of the organization. Moreover, employee turnover could also bring negatively impact morale, employee training and transfers.

Literature

Chruden, HJ & Sherman, AW 1972, Personal management, South-Western, Philippine
Mobley, WH 1982, Employee Turnover: Causes, Consequences, and Control, Addison-Wesley, Philippines
Tanke, ML 2001, Human Resources Management for the Hospitality Industry, 2nd ed., Thomson Learning, Albany, NY
Tham, ZG, Pee, L & Kankanhalli, A, Turnover in Information Systems Development Projets – Managing Forgetting, National University of Singapore, Singapore
William, H, Pinkovitz, Moskal, J & Green, G 2006, How much does your employee turnover cost?, viewed 10 February 2009,
Stephen, T 2009, Employee turnover and retention, viewed 25 October 2009,
Willis, M 2002, ‘Reducing Employee Turnover’, Creating Quality Newsletter, Vol. 11, No. 5, viewed 25 October 2009,
Osman, MG 2008, Job performance vs. Employee turnover, viewed 25 October 2009, http://knol.google.com/k/osman-masahudu-gunu/job-peformance-vs-employee-turnover/1kietb77pgwru/3

Schedules of Reinforcement

In operant conditioning, reinforcement schedules are an important component of the learning process. When and how often you reinforce a behavior can have a dramatic impact on the strength and speed of response. Some strengthening programs can be more effective in specific situations. There are two types of reinforcement schedules:

1. Continuous reinforcement

In the continuous reinforcement, the desired behavior is reinforced every time it happens. In general, this program is the best option during the initial stages of learning to create a strong association between behavior and response. Once firmly attached to the answer if the reinforcement is usually changed to a partial reinforcement schedule.

2. Partial reinforcement

In partial reinforcement, the response is reinforced only part time. learned behaviors are acquired more slowly with partial reinforcement, but the response is more resistant to extinction. There are four partial reinforcement schedules:

A. fixed-ratio schedules are those in which a response is reinforced only after a certain number of responses. This program produces a high rate, steady Responding with only a brief pause after the delivery of the reinforcer.

B. variable ratio schedules occur when a response is reinforced after an unpredictable number of responses. This program creates a high steady rate of responding. Gambling and lottery games are good examples of a reward based on a variable ratio schedule.

C. fixed interval schedules are those that reward the first response after a specific period of time has elapsed. This timetable means that large quantities to meet near the end of the range, but much slower to respond immediately after delivery of the reinforcer.

D. variable interval schedules occur when a response is rewarded after an unpredictable amount of time has passed. This program produces a slow, steady rate of response.